A short distance westward, the Alabama River is formed by the union of the Coosa and Tallapoosa, and coming down a winding course a few miles from the junction, sweeps around a grand bend to then go away towards the setting sun, and ultimately seek the Gulf. The story is that a wearied Creek Indian, seeking quiet in the far-off land, wandered out of the mountains to the fertile plains of this attractive region. Charmed by the scenery and the beauties of the valley, when he reached the bank of the river he gazed about him, and then struck his spear into the earth, saying _Alabama_--"Here we Rest." At this grand bend of the river, upon a circle of hills surrounded by rich farming lands, is Montgomery, the capital of Alabama. There was an Indian village here in remote times, and traders came to the place, so that gradually a settlement grew, which in 1817 was made a town and named after the unfortunate General Montgomery who fell in storming Quebec. The bluffs rise to Capitol Hill, crowned with the State House, a small but imposing structure, having from its elevated dome an extensive view. Here was organized the Government of the Confederate States in February, 1861, continuing until the capital was removed to Richmond the following May. In the grounds there is a handsome Confederate Monument. There are thirty thousand people in Montgomery, and it has a large trade in cotton, gathered from the adjacent districts, shipped down the river to Mobile and also by railroad to Savannah for export. In the suburbs are many old-fashioned plantation residences, and the adjacent country is largely a cotton-field, the great Southern staple growing luxuriantly on the black soils of this region. The Alabama people devote themselves chiefly to cotton-growing, and this industry leads throughout the vast section of the South below the Tennessee boundary. This great product is the leading foreign export of the United States, and being indirectly the cause of the Civil War, it brought to the Confederacy the sympathy of the nations of Europe, which were the chief consumers. Cotton is said to have originated in India, and in America was first cultivated for its flowers in Maryland. It was not until about the beginning of the nineteenth century, however, that the invention by Eli Whitney of the cotton-gin enabled the seeds to be easily removed from the lint, and thus enlarged the uses of cotton, so that a rapid increase was given its growth and also its manufacture throughout the civilized world. Both the seed and the lint are now used, the former producing valuable oil.